TWO exhausted men on two plodding horses entered two castles at roughly the same time that evening. Tilal, riding through the gates of Swalekeep after one Hell of a day, was greeted with cheers and, a little later, word that Halian, Aurar, Rialt, and Mevita were dead. Pol, farther east and north where it was already dark, ordered the three Cunaxan lords close confined and guarded, kissed his wife and daughters, and went upstairs to what he suspected would be his second battle in two days— this one with his mother.
He found her kneeling placidly before the fire in her bedchamber, stirring a pottery jar of mulled wine. Meath was nowhere in evidence. Sioned didn’t even glance around as he closed the door.
“So you had a lovely time, did you?”
“If you mean did we win, yes.”
“I know. I heard it in your step. The way a man walks when killing has wearied his body but renewed his spirit. Congratulations. Have some wine.”
He lowered himself into a chair near the hearth, sprawling saddle-stiff legs. She ladled out two cups and handed him one.
“Drink up, High Prince. A toast to Prince Zehava, whose dream you’ve made real.”
“Not yet. Birioc got away.” He took a large swallow so quickly that it didn’t have time to burn his tongue. “Tallain is chasing him down.”
She shrugged philosophically. “Well, what’s one Mer-ida, more or less? It’ll be a generation before they can breed enough fighters to try again.”
“This will be their last generation,” he replied, and drank to it.
“Is that your dream?” She settled on the rug, a bent knee supporting her elbow. “A trifle limited, imaginatively speaking.”
His temper began to fray. “Mother—”
“Oh, don’t tense up like that. After a long ride and all that waving your sword around, you’ll be sore enough as it is. Finish your wine and go to bed.”
He watched her fill her own cup again and asked quietly, “Do you put Meath through this, too, or is it a privilege granted only to me?”
Sioned arched her brows. “Feeling sorry for yourself, I take it.”
“Only trying to understand you.”
“Not worth the mental exercise.” She drank again, long fingers cradling the cup. “Tell me about your triumph, Pol. You need an appreciative audience. Come, darling, regale me with the tale of your slaughter.”
“Stop it.”
“No, truly, I’m fascinated.” She turned a wickedly dancing green gaze on him. “I enjoy a good killing. Surely you knew that about me.”
He stayed silent, watching her, wondering why he’d come up here tonight. He knew what she did every evening. They all did. If he wanted her help, he wouldn’t get it. If he wanted to help her—she wouldn’t let him. He knew that. He wondered why he was here.
“It was a pretty trick, you know,” she went on. “Very neatly done.”
“You saw?”
“Not the battle. After. Of course, I wouldn’t have let them live. But the one you lit like a candlewick—now, that was much more my style.” She saluted him with the wine cup.
“Stop it,” he said again, wearily. “Why? I thought you wanted applause.”
“I want to know what you’re thinking. I don’t unless you tell me. I’m not Father. I can’t read you the way he did.”
“Let’s unwrap the velvet from it, shall we? What you mean is that you won’t be your father. How deeply would it shock you to be told that neither of us ever wanted you to be?”
“Then what do you want?”
“Honestly?” When he nodded, she said, “To be left alone.”
“I can’t do that. I need you.”
“We’ve had this conversation before, Pol.”
He sat forward. “And we’ll go on having it until—“
“Until what?” She smiled, a brittle mockery of the smile he remembered. “Hatchling dear, do you intend to claw at your old mother until she fights back? Is that the plan?” Her laughter was worse: tolerant, frightening. “You’re right, you don’t know what I’m thinking. Go to bed, Pol.”
Pol threw his empty wine cup into the fire. It shattered against the stone. He knew it for a childish gesture, but couldn’t help it. Sioned didn’t so much as blink.
“What do you want?” he cried. “I can’t give you back Father! I can’t be him for you—all-wise and all-powerful and losing this damned war! I need your help!”
“To do what? You’ve eliminated the threat from the Merida. Soon enough you’ll go out and kill all the Vel-lant’im, too. You don’t need anyone but yourself to do any of it.” Dipping the ladle again, she paused to pick a pottery shard out before she poured into her cup. “Still ... war is easy, isn’t it? A simple, direct passion. Some people find it sublimely satisfying. Kostas did. I think fighting the Vellant’im made him happier than anything else in his life. Your grandfather Zehava seems to have been the same. When there weren’t any more Merida to fight he didn’t know what to do with himself.”
Pol nearly held his breath. She was talking to him, really talking, the way she’d exchanged thoughts and musings with Rohan.
“Roelstra, now, he wasn’t like that at all. He got others to do his fighting for him. His passion was power, and amusing himself with it.” All at once she smiled that terrifying smile again. “lanthe was just like him. But she was stupid. She let me live.”
“She—“ The rest of it strangled him.
“I suppose you thought the supreme moment of her life was giving birth to you. Think again. The days she kept us here were the finest she ever knew. Me without a son, Rohan with no heir but the bastard of a woman we both despised—Goddess, how she laughed! I heard her then—and for years afterward...”
An expression of vague bewilderment crossed her face. A swift gaze darted around the room, but whatever she looked for wasn’t there. The Feruche that had been, perhaps.
“She let me live, Pol. A quite literally fatal mistake. I killed her as surely as if I’d held the sword myself.”
Who did kill her, then? he wanted to ask, but didn’t dare interrupt.
“Do you know who you remind me of?” she went on. “Andrade. She saw opposition as a personal affront, just as you do.” She straightened her back to regal dignity and intoned, “ ‘Who are all these fools, that they don’t recognize that I know what’s best for them?’ “ Then she shook her head, slouching easily over her drawn-up knee again. “No, you don’t see arrogance like that but once in a lifetime. But I give you one thing, Pol. You don’t manipulate people quite the way she did. You don’t use their feelings. You learned that much from Rohan, anyway.” Looking up at him where he sat in the chair, she added, “After a battle, you see the survivors and how they can be used to win the next one.”
“But that’s just it!” he exclaimed. “What I should be seeing is how I can help them return to their lives, to rebuild the world we used to have before all this—“
“Interesting. I hadn’t thought of that. What I meant was that you never see the dead.”
Stung, he countered, “Father saw nothing else.”
“Don’t you believe it,” she retorted. “He grieved for the dead—but he also sorrowed with the living. It’s a distinction which might escape you. But it’s what made him a man people would walk through Hell for—because they knew he’d never ask it of them.” When she drank this time, a few drops trickled from a corner of her mouth. She wiped them away with the back of her hand. “And that, my precious, is why you are not the prince your father was.”
“Well, I’m all you’ve got,” he said bitterly. “You’ll just have to make do with inferior goods.”
“ ‘Inferior’?” Sioned laughed again. “I take it back. You are almost as stupid as lanthe. I’ve talked for— what, three cups, four?—and you still don’t understand.”
“Enlighten me,” he said through gritted teeth.
“For one thing, you’re tougher than he ever was.” She ran a slightly shaky hand through her shorn hair. “War breaks dreams, Pol. And that breaks hearts.”
He was afraid to ask it, which meant he had to ask it. “Mother ... do you want me to build his dreams again?”
She stared at him. “Whatever for?”
“That’s what parents expect,” he shrugged. “To carry forward—“
“As if you owed it to us? What a ridiculous idea. We owed you the best we could give you.” She raised her cup to him. “What you do with it is your problem, not mine.”
He had to ask this one, too. “What if there’s nothing left to build on?”
“You just don’t know yet what your dream looks like.” Suddenly her eyes softened. “Just make sure it’s worthy of you. That’s the hardest part, I know.”
How could she understand him perfectly when he didn’t understand her at all?
She smiled—a real smile this time. “Not what you came to hear, is it?”
“That doesn’t matter. It’s you saying it.”
“AH you ask of me is words? No, I don’t think so. There’ll be much more before this is over. Just don’t ask it tonight. Frankly, I’m not up to it.”
She set the cup down and pushed herself to her feet. Her words were immune to wine; her body was not. Pol helped her to the bed. When she stretched out, already asleep, he tucked the quilt around her. Light from the bedside candles whitened the crescent scar on her cheek, the scar that matched his own. He knew her face as well as he knew his own. But he’d never been able to read her.
No one had, except Rohan.
He blew the candies dark and left her to sleep.
*
Sionell woke at dawn to a warm, safe, married feeling. She snuggled closer to her husband’s solid frame, rubbing her cheek against the thick mat of dark blond hair on his chest. But as she inhaled drowsily of his scent, she started to full wakefulness. He stank of sweat, leather, and horse. And blood.
“Tallain!”
“Hmm? What?”
She flung the covers back and began a frantic inspection of his naked body with eyes and fingers. So many bruises, so many places where the straps and buckles of his armor had chafed the skin.
“Sionell!” he exclaimed. “What in the world are you doing?”
“You’re all right—tell me you’re not hurt!”
“Just bumped around a bit, nothing to signify. Ell, that tickles!”
Ignoring his protest, she knelt and tugged him over onto his stomach. At his right shoulder blade, where a gap in the stiffened leather armor allowed for the flex of muscle, was a long, narrow gash. Grabbing the water pitcher from the bedside table, she moistened a corner of the sheet and daubed the dried blood from the wound. Tallain yelped. “Stop it. That’s cold!”
“Hush up. Are you hurt anywhere else?”
“It didn’t hurt there until you started pouring ice water on it! Will you—“ He rolled over and seized her wrists. “Will you,” he repeated, “please settle down and give me a proper welcome?”
“Tallain—“
But he pulled her atop him and demonstrated his notion of welcome. When he had finished kissing her, she propped herself on one arm and scowled at him. He smiled back.
She gave him a shove. “What are you doing here?”
“Were you expecting someone other than me in your bed?”
“Don’t be silly. What happened? Is Riyan with you? You should have woken me when you got home.”
“I was barely awake myself.” He lay on his side and gathered a handfu! of her unbound hair, bringing it to his cheek. “You smell beautiful.”
“Well, you stink to the High Veresch and look even worse. How many days since you won the battle?”
“Two. How did you know we won?”
“You’re here,” she replied succinctly. Rising, she pulled on a bedrobe against the morning chill. “You need something to eat—and a bath while you’re waiting for it. You can tell me everything that happened.”
“Not just now, Ell.”
She decided to let that go by unremarked. After going to the outer door to summon the servants, on her way back she picked up the trousers, shirt, and tunic he’d let fall on his way to bed. “Ugh! These will be burned at once.”
Tallain yawned. “Apologies for inflicting my stink on you, my lady.”
Her eyes stung with sudden ridiculous tears. “Don’t be silly,” she repeated. “You’re home and safe—oh, Tallain, what happened?”
“You were right, we won. The only thing of mine that bled was my sword, Ell. Goddess, it fairly wept blood...” He lay back in bed and closed his eyes, and when he spoke again his voice was supple and easy. “I gave the blue suite to the Isulki warlord. He’s a bit crazy, but—“
“Kazander? He’s here?”
Tallain propped himself on his elbows. “You know him?”
“I met him in 729, when I took Talya to visit my parents.” She chuckled suddenly with the memory. “And he is quite mad, in a charming sort of way.”
“Charming,” Tallain echoed flatly. “Well, he’s here, now that Merida hunting has proven unprofitable. Have the steward look after him, please.”
“What aren’t you telling me, love?” she murmured, but so low that he didn’t hear.
A seemingly endless parade of servants arrived carrying buckets of hot water to dump in the tub. From early spring until late autumn, the roof cisterns provided all the sun-heated water anyone could need. But in winter, fuel and labor must do what in other seasons light and plumbing accomplished. While Tallain soaked his bruises and washed off the dirt, Sionell played squire by choosing his clothes and arranging his meal beside his favorite chair. A page was sent to ask Lady Lyela to take care of the children for the morning—Sionell’s three would like that, they adored their father’s cousin. The steward came to report that Lady Rabisa was no better and no worse. She washed and dressed herself, but must be persuaded to eat, and said not a word to anyone. Usually Sionell spent part of each morning with her brother’s widow, talking or reading to her, coaxing her to pay some heed to her two small children. But Jah-navi’s death had killed something inside Rabisa. She was content to let life around her go on without her, uninterested even in watching.
Sionell gave all the needful orders for a normal day at Tiglath, with special attention to Lord Kazander’s comfort. Her portion of the world thus arranged, she closed the doors on it and concentrated on her husband.
He let her dress the cut on his back and rub salve across his bruises, smiling as she gave him yet another inspection for other wounds. Wrapped in a warm bed-robe of blue Giladan wool, he sank into the sagging old armchair and devoured his breakfast and hers, too, as if he hadn’t eaten hi days. She saw the last of the elk sausage disappear, hid a smile, and poured more taze.
At last he leaned back, replete and almost drowsy again. But his dark eyes were dancing as he said, “I’ve had less efficient servants, and much less beautiful—but none of them ever made me suspicious with their care of me.”
“You said you wanted a proper welcome,” she replied archly. “Now do I get to ask all those awkward questions?”
“I suppose you must.”
Sionell slid from her chair to perch on a footstool at Tallain’s knee. “I haven’t any. You fought a battle and won. Some of the Merida got away. You and Kazander have been chasing them down. But I don’t think lack of success is why you came home.”
“I came home...” He paused, then lifted one shoulder in a self-deprecating shrug. “I came home because I missed you.”
“Flattering, my lord, but hardly good strategy.”
“It is, though. Strategy, I mean. Birioc gained Tuath but that doesn’t do him any good. It’s nothing but a shell. He lost to Pol at Zagroy’s Pillar. He needs a victory, and if I make Tiglath seem easy enough—”
“Wait—go back. Pol was in the righting?” He told it sparingly. By the time he spoke of what Pol and Kazander had done after the battle, he looked sick. Sionell had offered her hands halfway through the description; when he finished, he was clinging to them so hard that her knuckles were crushed.
“Rohan did the same thing,” he whispered. “My father told me about it. But watching Pol seal the wounds with Sunrunner’s Fire—EH, it was unclean. A perversion of what Sunrunners ought to be. It wasn’t just what he did. It was the way he did it. So ... casual. I think it was watching how he didn’t seem to feel anything that unsettled me most.”
“He can be cold, our prince,” she murmured. “You must have been glad to get away. And don’t you dare feel ashamed, either. What Pol did was barbaric.”
“What he did was necessary.” Tallain eased the pressure on her hands and raised them to his lips. “I had to come home to you, Ell. I had to see you and the children and all we’ve done here to remind myself why it is necessary.”
“But not like that. Never like that.” Her head turned as someone knocked on the door and a voice spoke Tal-lain’s name and title. “Not now!” she called, but the damage had been done. Tallain brushed another kiss to her bruised hands and got to his feet.
“Come in, Lord Kazander.”
Eight years had added height, breadth, and a thick mustache, but the essentials—luminous black eyes, a dazzling smile, and a lean, quick grace—were unchanged. Kazander bowed deeply before giving her the traditional eyes-lips-heart salute of his people.
“The Lady Sionell, who in two flicks of a dragon’s tail captured and shattered my youthful heart! Why is it that all the best, most beautiful, most desirable women are already married by the day I meet them?”
Amusement almost made her forgive him for spoiling their solitude. She rose and extended her hand to him. “Your father’s son, I see. Welcome to Tiglath, my lord korrus.”
“And you are your mother’s daughter. She, too, breaks my heart on a regular schedule.” He sighed. “Mine is a bitter destiny, my lady.”
“Coveting other men’s wives, when you’ve three of your own? Oh, yes, I hear all about you from my parents, Lord Kazander. Have you been made comfortable here? If there’s anything you lack—“
“There is, in fact. The so-called Prince Birioc’s head.” He turned to Tallain. “My men and I have toured your walls, my lord. I see now the wisdom of your plans and apologize for my stupidity in doubting. When do you wish the evacuation to begin?”
“The what?” Sionell exclaimed.
Tallain gave a long sigh. Kazander put both hands to his head and moaned.
“Flay my unworthy hide with your most exquisite whips, my lord, and you could not increase my agony—“
“Oh, do be quiet, Kazander,” Tallain said wearily. “You might as well hear it straight, Ell. It’ll take Birioc at least a day to organize his reinforcements and march on Tiglath. I’m betting on two. By that time anyone who can’t hold a sword or a bow will be well on the way to Feruche.”
“I understand, my lord,” she said mildly. If anything, he grew more tense. “And?”
“And what, my lord?”
“Don’t you ‘my lord’ me, Sionell. There’s more. There’s always more.” He pointed a finger at her. “I know you.”
Kazander was looking from one to the other of them, holding his breath. Sionell cursed his presence yet again, for she would have to speak calmly. One did not shriek in front of guests. Especially not when the guest would enjoy it — as long as it was not directed at him.
“Yes, my lord,” she answered sweetly. “And you also know that I know how to use a knife.” Her success in surprising both men was most satisfying. “A knife,” she repeated silkily, “for the throat of anyone who shows me a horse and the road to Feruche, rather than a bow and a clear shot at the Merida.”
Tallain sighed again and sank into his chair. Kazander exhaled too, muttering, “Gentle Goddess, Mother of Dragons — Lady Feylin all over again.”
“Thank you,” she said, dividing a smile between them. “Lord Kazander, if you’ll be so good as to tell my maid on your way out that I’d like to see Lady Lyela, please?” He bowed again and made his escape. Had he stayed, he would have been surprised again, for her smile only grew wider. Tallain was not surprised. But then, Tallain had been living with her for over eleven years. “You didn’t really think I’d go, did you?” she asked. “No.”
“And you didn’t really want me to, either.”
“No. I’m a weak and selfish man, my love.” He looked up at her through a spill of overlong blond hair, a look she had never been able to resist. “And you are very good with a bow — as well as a knife.”
“I ought to be. I learned both from Tobin.”
Until now, everyone had performed to Camanto’s exacting specifications. His brother Edirne had led the army Camanto had assembled to the Ussh River. Through a courier, Laric had renewed his request to cross; Edirne had refused. Laric had ridden to the shore himself to demand passage through Fessenden; Edirne had shouted back something embarrassingly pompous about the inviolability of Fessenden soil. Laric had called Edirne a fool; Edirne had not noticed when Camanto struggled against a sardonic grin of complete agreement.
But instead of doing what any rational man would, and starting south as Camanto had planned for him to do, Laric turned his small contingent north. Exactly what he should not have done.
But perhaps that was why he did it. Perhaps he thought he was being denied this crossing (which he was) so they could drive him south (which they could) to frustrate him again at another bridge (which he would not be, but he couldn’t know that).
Camanto ground his teeth, cursing the Fironese prince. Lane’s thoughts were unquestionably directed north, to Balarat. So he directed his troops there as well—the idiot. If Camanto had learned anything in a life spent as eldest son but not the heir, it was that the best path to a desired goal almost never involved a straight line.
Edirne galloped back from the riverbank, flushed with his success. Camanto listened to him congratulate himself for a while, then begged his brother’s advice on what to do next.
“Next? What do you mean? Laric has no choice but to withdraw. He knows he’s outnumbered, and if he dares defy us and attempt a crossing, we’ll crush him.”
“Yes, brother,” Camanto murmured. “You made that abundantly clear. But if he truly understands this, then why is he riding north for the bridge at Silver Hill?”
Edirne appeared sorely confused for all of five heartbeats. Then he gave a bright, braying laugh. “How wonderful that he’s so stupid! I’ve always wanted to win a battle against the Fironese, just like our ancestor whose namesake I am!”
Camanto did not point out that Laric had been born on Dorval—or that the majority of his force was made up of men and women from Dragon’s Rest. The new High Prince would not look kindly on his people being killed. Most especially did he stay silent about the terrain at Silver Hill, which was all soft hills on the Princemarch side of the Ussh and all steep cliffs on the Fessenden. An army of mountain goats couldn’t defend it.
Then an appalling idea struck him. Edirne might be considering crossing the bridge to attack Laric in Princemarch.
When his brother commanded a quick march north to Silver Hill, Camanto kept his tongue between his teeth by the simple expedient of biting it. Hard. His problems quickly reshuffled in priority as well as difficulty. Now he must spend his cleverness in keeping his brother this side of the river instead of maneuvering Laric south. Goddess in glory, he thought, why did no one ever do what he was supposed to?
*
More people than Sionell had expected declined the safety of Feruche. At noon, the guildmaster—Tiglath’s leading goldsmith, and by all opinions an artist of rare gifts—held council with his fellows who dealt in wool and foodstuffs and glass and the holding’s other produce. A short time later he came to the castle and said they were all agreed. Children under the age of fourteen would leave, and women who were nursing, and those whose pregnancies were not advanced enough to make the journey a hazard. All this was as Tallain had suggested. But the rest, those who lived in Tiglath and those who had escaped the destruction of Tuath, would stay.
“The ones who can’t fight will run supplies and tend the wounded, my lord. As for the elders...” He shrugged. “My wife’s grandmother speaks for them, being the one with the most years. Her language wasn’t fit to repeat in highborn company, but you can guess what she said.”
“I can indeed,” Tallain replied, momentarily amused. “I’ve had the honor of conversation with her before. But can’t you persuade her?”
Sionell nudged him with her elbow. “Don’t make the guildmaster do what you’re afraid to! And what neither of you could do in any case. It’s going to be a hard enough journey for the children. All those measures across the Long Sand would rattle old bones loose from their sockets.”
“Her very words, my lady,” the guildmaster said, then grinned. “The polite ones, anyway!” To Tallain, he added, “Lots will be drawn for the fifty you requested to accompany Lady Lyela.”
“There will be an armed escort as well. They leave at dusk. Please let everyone know that their wives and children will be as protected as I can manage, and that I hope they’ll all be back home before too long.”
“We trust this will happen, my lord,” the guildmaster said with a bow, and Sionell heard what he really meant: We trust you, my lord.
When they were alone, she mentioned it to Tallain. He shook his head, smiling a little.
“That may be. I just hope I don’t disappoint them. But their eagerness to stay and fight is made of equal parts loyalty to me and hatred for the Merida.”
“Granted. But loyalty alone doesn’t breed such trust, Tallain. It takes love as well.”
He looked puzzled. “I’ve done my duty by them, I think,” he said at length, and the seriousness of it made her laugh.
“And why shouldn’t they love you? You’re theirs and they know it with pride.” She reached over to brush the wayward hair from his brow. “Theirs, long before you were mine,” she added.
“But yours with all my heart,” he said, still solemn. Sionell hesitated, then put her hand to his cheek. “Don’t think too much about what Pol did. I know it’s in your mind that you may have to do much the same thing. But you’ll find another way, I know you will. Something with honor in it.”
“This from the woman who wanted a Merida hide to hang on her wall?” he asked, but there was no amusement in his eyes to match the curve of his mouth. After a moment, he went to the balcony doors, looking down at the bustle of preparations for this evening’s leavetak-ing. “There’s no honor in war, Sionell. There’s only killing enough of them so they can’t rise again and kill us. We’ve never done it in the past. The Merida always come back again. One generation, two—I don’t want my children to have to face them yet again. So all of them must die this time. Pol had the right of it. But he didn’t go far enough. He should have killed all of them after the battle, not just the wounded.” He stroked the stone lintel. “If the Goddess gives me the blessing of a chance, I won’t make the same mistake.”
And she knew that if the Goddess gave him the curse of that chance, it would haunt him the rest of his days. At dusk, when farewells had been said and Lyela had ridden out the gates leading the refugees, Tallain drew Sionell into the solar that was their family’s private retreat. It was too quiet, and too empty. Lyela’s lap-sized harp had vanished into a cupboard; Antalya’s small embroidery frame had been covered with a cloth next to her usual chair, and her basket of bright yarns hidden beneath it. Even the children’s toys were gone, packed away for their return or crammed into saddlebags for the journey to Feruche.
But two goblets had been set out, already filled with wine. Sionell frowned a little on seeing them—a gift from her parents when she and Tallain had been married ten years. Dark blue Fironese crystal was cradled in elegant spirals of gold; Tiglath’s colors.
“I thought we’d wait here for Vamanis to bring us word,” Tallain said.
Sionell nodded and sat down at the little table where they usually played chess—and he always won. “He looked for Birioc half the day. He must be cowering under a rock somewhere, to escape a Sunrunner.”
“Well, he has to move today or tomorrow. He’ll find him.” He raised his goblet in a silent toast, and drank. She did the same. “I hope I’ve made Tiglath seem easy enough. I wish I knew more about him—how he thinks, whether he’s as blindly arrogant as his father.”
“Meiglan isn’t. But then, she’s not a Merida. I wonder who his mother was, and if Miyon knew who he was bedding.”
“And what he was begetting,” Tallain added. Stretching out his legs, he gave a sudden smile. “Jahnev looked fine, didn’t he? Lyela said he insisted on carrying the banner.”
“I hope she gets it away from him before he drops it. He’d never forgive himself. But he did look quite the grown-up squire—even though the flagpole is three times taller than he is.”
They shared a smile of pride in their elder son, and began discussing the drills their people would practice today at the walls. Halfway through her wine, Sionell noticed that Tallain seemed to be waiting for something. Vamanis, of course, but it wasn’t the door he watched. It was her.
Suddenly she yawned. Tallain arched a teasing brow. “I realize the efficient dispersal of fresh arrows isn’t exactly the most fascinating topic, but do try to pay attention, my love.”
“I’m tired, not bored—and it’s your fault. I don’t sleep well when you’re gone, and you don’t let me sleep at all when you’re here.”
He grinned unrepentantly and went on talking about supplies. She yawned again, this time widely enough to crack her jaw. “I’m sorry—what did you say?”
“Only that the whetstones will be busy tonight, sharpening swords.”
She nodded and set the goblet down. It was more and more difficult to focus her mind on his words.
“Tallain,” she interrupted irritably, “why are you staring at me as if I were dripping off moments like a water clock?” Suddenly she couldn’t seem to keep her eyes open.
Tallain got to his feet. “Sionell?” His fingers sought the pulse at her throat. “For a moment I thought I hadn’t given you enough.”
She dragged her eyelids open by sheer force of will. “Enough of what?” she tried to ask, but managed only an inarticulate mumble.
“Forgive me, my darling,” he said, very tenderly. “But I do know you very well.”
He straightened and went to the door. She commanded herself to watch, but her eyes had closed again.
“Lord Kazander? You swear to me you’ll take good care of her?”
“My lord, as if she were the mother of my sons.” Tallain chuckled. “Well, she’s not, and don’t get any ideas!”
“My lord sees into my deepest heart. I crave forgiveness.”
“Speaking of which, if I were in your boots I’d be well out of her way when she’s completely herself again.”
“Better advice was never given, my lord. I’d thought to go hunting. Perhaps as far as Castle Crag. Perhaps until spring.”
“Wise choice.”
Sionell discovered with vague amusement that she couldn’t even be angry. Not yet, anyway, she thought fuzzily. And then she couldn’t think anymore, her mind betraying her as her body had already done. As her husband had already done. Dimly, she heard footfalls on the carpet and the rustle of Tallain’s silk shirt. She was gathered up in his arms, held close and tight.
“Forgive me,” he murmured again, from very far away. “But I have to know you’re safe. You understand, don’t you, love?”
She never felt him give her carefully over to Kazand-er’s strong arms.
*
Shortly after moonrise, Hollis descended the last dozen steps of the one hundred and six that spiraled up to the top of the Sunrunner Tower—tallest at Feruche—and paused to rub her aching leg muscles before turning toward the Attic.
It wasn’t literally an attic. It wasn’t even at the top of any section of the castle. The architect’s drawings labeled it the Sunrise Chamber for the spectacular eastern view, and it served as a private family dining room. But when Riyan and Ruala finished stuffing it with things collected, inherited, or given over the years, the Attic it became.
Here resided everything from the belt and jeweled wine-horn old Prince Clutha of Meadowlord had given Riyan at his knighting to four polished copper plates that had belonged to Ruala’s great-great-grandmother. The contents of only one display cabinet were: Maara’s silver rattle and lace Naming gown, dice cups, a chess set (glass, and too fragile to use), a little wooden horse carved by Riyan in childhood (wobbly on the off foreleg), a herd of crystal deer in varying sizes, Ruala’s collection of hunting knives, framed needlework samplers, a glazed clay model of Feruche, and the twelve beaten-gold wine cups that had been the gift of Ruala’s grandfather at her marriage.
There were four such cabinets, wooden shelves beneath every window, and a mantlepiece—all crammed with similar items. When one included in the morass the pair of lutes kept for Ostvel’s visits, the huge tapestry frame that had belonged to Ruala’s mother, a carved chest full of yarns, a wall hanging here and there, the oval fruitwood table that seated twelve easily and twenty at a pinch, chairs to match, two large sofas, a smattering of footstools and other chairs, a few convenient little tables, and the sideboard that took up half a wall, the Attic was an eminently appropriate name.
Hollis never entered it without feeling that Sorin would have approved the happy clutter. The big table indicated his intent for this room: large gatherings of family and friends, and plenty of children of his own. She could almost imagine it: Sorin at one end and Betheyn at the other, with herself and Maarken, Riyan and Ruala, Pol and Meiglan, and all their parents and offspring scattered between making a glorious noise.
Andry, too, with his sons and daughters. Sorin might have done it, Hollis told herself. He might have brought them all close again—as a family, if not as a political whole.
So many were missing from the imagined scene: the dead, the never-born. Sorin’s hopes were as dead as he was. Shaking off her sadness, and reminding herself that tonight she could bring good news to leaven the bitter, she took a place at the table and drank deep of the cup of taze Riyan poured for her.
“Well?” Maarken asked impatiently. “What did you see?”
She smiled. “Oh, nothing much.”
“Hollis...” he warned.
“Just that the Vellant’im were defeated outside Swale-keep yesterday, and now it belongs to Tilal and Ostvel.” Riyan gave a whoop of sheer irrepressible delight that had the others laughing. Hollis, seated next to him, covered her ears and grimaced.
“I think your father heard you all the way in Meadowlord,” she said when things had quieted down. “He’s perfectly all right, by the way, and not happy about it. Tilal didn’t let him anywhere near the fighting.”
“Good for Tilal,” Chay said. “Is he unhurt, too?”
“A sword cut in one leg, a bad bruise on his back. Nothing serious, but enough to keep him from riding after Chiana and Rinhoel.”
Sighing, Maarken shook his head. “I knew you were giving us the good news first.”
“/ knew we should have ordered something stronger to drink,” Meath countered. “Isriam, pretend for a moment you’re still a squire and not a knight, and bring that pitcher of wine over here.”
As the young man went to the sideboard, others began asking questions. Tobin rapped the knuckles of her good hand on the table. “Hush,” she commanded, and then, to Hollis, “Talk.”
“The worst of it isn’t Chiana. Kerluthan died in the battle. It all happened yesterday. Pol, will you send to Dragon’s Rest when you can? Edrel was your squire. You’ll know better than I how to tell him through Hil-dreth that his brother is dead.”
He nodded slowly. “There’s no Sunrunner at River Ussh to let Kerluthan’s wife know. Has Tilal sent a rider?”
“Yes.” She paused, still looking at Pol. “Halian is dead, too.”
“Don’t tell me the Parchment Prince rode into battle!” Pol exclaimed.
“No. Ostvel found him and Lady Aurar in Chiana’s rooms. Both dead. Both murdered, I should have said.”
“Goddess,” Maarken breathed. “Who?” Then he gave a start and looked sick to his stomach.
“Rinhoel,” Chay murmured.
“Palila saw him do it,” Hollis said. “She told Naydra before she stopped saying anything at all.”
“I think you’d better start at the beginning,” Riyan said grimly.
“Not yet.” Pol had held Hollis’ gaze, and she knew he had seen it in her eyes. “Who else was killed?”
“Lady Cluthine,” she replied. “Trying to get word of Swalekeep’s defenses and Chiana’s treason to Tilal.”
“Who else?” he said again.
This time she had to tell him. They had been friends, and Named their son for him. “Rialt and Mevita,” she whispered. “Their throats slit by Chiana’s order. Naydra killed the guard who killed them, Pol. With Fire.”
Into the silence, Meath said, “So she knows now what she is.”
Meiglan rose shakily from her chair. “And—and their little boy?” she asked in a reedy voice.
“Alive and safe. Not even Chiana and Rinhoel would murder children.”
“Don’t bet on it,” Chay rasped.
Meiglan was white as winter moonlight. “If you’ll excuse me,” she managed, “I should go look in on the children. Isriam, will you come with me, please?”
Pol touched her hand, frowning with worry. “Meggie, are you all right?”
Fool, Hollis thought. Let her escape with some dignity. She’s trying so hard, poor little thing.
“Yes, my lord,” Meiglan answered with a thin smile. “But the girls have been too quiet, you’ll agree.”
Ruala helped by saying dryly, “The three of them have recruited an army—the Dorvali children. Today they stormed the kitchen, which is why dinner was a little late.”
Meiglan’s smile was a little more genuine. “Did I say ‘quiet’? Wish me luck!”
That got her to the door, supported by Isriam. Hollis willed Pol not to say anything more, but a stronger will than hers had been at work on him. Tobin had caught his gaze, black eyes fierce beneath knitted brows. He took the hint.
With Meiglan and Isriam gone, everyone looked at Hollis again. She was glad now of the wine. After a long swallow, she gathered herself and began at the beginning. When she was finished with the story as Ostvel had told it to Andrev, and Andrev had told it to her, the elation of the victory at Swalekeep had been forgotten. She had known it would be; that was why she had told that part first. They had all needed to hear it and enjoy it before the price of the victory was told.
After moistening her throat with more wine, she went on to talk of what she had seen at other places. Skybowl was quiet, with fifty or so Vellant’im camped down below it, obviously wondering what to do. The main army was still outside the ruin of Stronghold. At High Kirat, the court Sunrunner Diandra had told her that Tilal’s son Rihani had arrived that day, been reassured about his parents, and promptly collapsed into much-needed sleep. Clouds had threatened around Tiglath, Dragon’s Rest, and Kierst, so she had nothing to report from there. But she’d discovered something strange at Goddess Keep.
“I looked there first, just as the sun was setting. They were at the walls singing the ritual as usual. You know that Oclel and Rusina were lost. They’ve now been re- placed. I don’t know the woman. But the man is an old friend of yours, Meath. Antoun.”
“Him? Never! He has no use for Andry’s mouthings!”
“It seems he does now. He’s been made one of the devr’im.”
“But he can’t be!” Meath was more upset than Hollis had ever seen him. “I know him, I’ve known him since we were first at Goddess Keep. He came with us to Stronghold when we brought Sioned to marry Rohan! I won’t believe he’s gone over to Andry.”
“That’s the other odd thing,” Hollis said. “Andry’s not there. He should have been leading the ritual for all the people outside the walls to see. But it was Torien who was in charge. Andry was nowhere to be found.”
“You didn’t think to ask, I take it?” Pol asked sharply.
Hollis stiffened. Maarken replied for her, “Go ask them yourself.”
“I just might.”
“Stop right there,” Chay ordered. Both men settled back in their chairs, though neither relaxed. Hollis felt a sudden painful longing for Rohan, who could master the most ungovernable temper with a single glance.
“We have other things to talk about besides my brother,” Maarken said.
Riyan picked up his cue. “On our way back here, Pol and I started talking about what we can do against the Vellant’im. That’s the main problem.”
Betheyn, silent until now, said, “And it’s likely to remain so until we discover why they’re here.”
Everyone turned to look at her. She bore the surprise and the scrutiny with steady calm, her hands folded neatly on the table. Her gaze sought each of them in turn: Riyan, Hollis, Maarken, Pol, Ruala, Tobin, Chay, Meath. Sunrunners, sorcerers, and one man who was “merely” powerful.
“Why do people make war?” Beth asked. “There are economic reasons—to gain land, goods, material wealth. Or to destroy an enemy’s ability to make material wealth.”
“Vengeance,” Ruala said. “To hurt as you’ve been hurt, and to destroy the enemy’s ability to hurt you again.”
“Yes,” Beth told her. “Especially that last. There’s politics, too—putting someone you favor into power, or getting rid of someone you don’t like. What else?”
“Pleasure,” said Tobin. “My f-father loved war.”
“He loved to prove his strength,” Chay corrected. “There’s another reason for you, Beth. But I have one more. Insanity.”
“That’s one I hadn’t considered,” she admitted.
“Your answers open up new questions,” Pol said abruptly. “Why have the Vellant’im gone to war against us? They obviously don’t want to stay and bring wealth from the land. They’re destroying everything they can get their hands on. Crippling our ability to produce food and goods. But that can’t be their only reason, else why attack the Desert?”
“And if they wanted to stay and set up their own princedoms, they would have left the land intact,” Hollis mused. “You can’t rule over burned farmhouses and fields. So politics isn’t it.”
“Unless what they want is to see us out and don’t care who takes over afterward,” Maarken said. “Which leads to the revenge idea. But revenge for what? What did we ever do to them? Goddess, we didn’t even know they existed until they attacked us!”
Betheyn shook her head. “Let’s hold off on that for a moment. They could be doing this for the enjoyment of it. They appear to be a people who love war—and they’re very good at it. Maybe we’re just convenient.”
“They ran out of other people to kill, you mean?” Pol growled. “If that’s true, then Chay’s answer is the best one. They are crazy.”
“You know better than that,” the Lord of Radzyn chided. “Look at their strategy. If war is organized madness, they’re depressingly well organized.”
Riyan leaned forward. “But that’s just what Pol and I were talking about the other day. What have they done so far? Kept everyone else occupied so no aid can come to the Desert. They took Radzyn—where Rohan was.
Then they took Remagev—where Rohan was. Then Stronghold—where Rohan was. What else does the Desert have to offer but sand and dragons—and the High Prince?”
“My father is dead,” Pol said flatly. “If it was him specifically, they’d celebrate his death and be gone. It’s got to be something we have here in the Desert, and it’s not the sand. They started out terrified of dragons until that whoreson commander of theirs killed Elidi.” He made an angry gesture that nearly swept his wine cup from the table. “We’re no closer to it than we were when we started.”
“With respect, my lord, I disagree,” Betheyn murmured. “We’ve been speaking as if they want something in the Desert. Some physical thing. I don’t believe what they want is a High Prince, or dragons, and certainly not our castles and land. Which leaves only one thing. Vengeance.”
“But what did we do to them?” Chay demanded.
“Not ‘we’ as in everyone in the princedoms, or even the Desert,” Riyan blurted. “ ‘We’ as in Sunrunners. They shout ‘diarmadh’im’ in battle. They’re kindred to the Merida. Something must have happened so long ago that we don’t even remember it—but they do. And they’ve come to take their revenge for what the Sunrunners did to them.”
“There’s nothing in the histories,” Meath said, eyes wide with shock. “Not even in Lady Merisei’s scrolls.”
“Yes, there is!” Pol slapped his hand down on the table. “She brought the Sunrunners from Dorval to overthrow diarmadhi rule. She had hundreds of them killed, forced the rest into the mountains, and almost wiped out the Merida completely. So now their distant brothers have come to do the same to us. They attacked Goddess Keep, and failed to take it only because of the ros’salath and Tilal’s army. They—“
“But how does that connect to what they’ve done here?” Hollis interrupted. “And why did they wait so long? Everyone who was responsible for whatever hap- pened—if it happened—has been dead hundreds of years. What’s the point?”
“My dear,” Chay said, “you’ll never understand because you’ve never had an evil thought in your life. Vengeance has nothing to do with time.”
“So we have Merisel to thank for all this? I don’t believe it. Not even from her. She and Gerik and Rosseyn were—“ But she ran out of words, for other words from the scrolls she had helped Andry translate suddenly scrawled across her mind. Casual words, almost teasing, a minor reference overshadowed by other things—
“Hollis? What is it?”
Pol was staring at her. She met his eyes, seeing Fire in them. She had been at Goddess Keep during Andrade’s rule, she had known Rohan well—but no one’s eyes had ever compelled her the way his did at this moment. She felt like a lute string drawn tight enough to snap, trembling with unreleased sound.
“Gerik,” she heard herself say, and the inner shaking got worse. “She wrote it as if it was an old joke...” Pol’s eyes caught unbearably at her mind. “He—he was born on the Desert side of the Veresch. Before he became a Sunrunner, he was called ‘Azhrei.’ “